Harte Land
by Harte-Lore
Summary: Harry has another cousin, one who cares about him much more than his current family does. How will this affect him throughout the course of his story? Infinitely more than anyone would have ever expected. Rewrite of Harte's Hope, hopefully much better than the previous. TW: Abuse in early chapters
1. Chapter 1

Okay guys, this is the first chapter of the Harte's Hope remake! Hopefully you like it better, and please, if you have any opinions or ideas of how you'd like the story changed or rewritten don't be afraid to message me!

I don't own any of the characters used in this chapter except perhaps the rather stupid doctors.

* * *

When he'd first been approached about the program, he'd adamantly refused to have anything to do with it.

Family Reconstruction and Reunification, they'd called it. A test designed to unearth any and all potential relatives, all with just a single vial of blood. It seemed like a dream come true for those trying to desperately locate loved ones... but he was not one of those people. He did not want to find the people who had abandoned him in the Abbey so long ago, nor did he have any desire to be found, now that he was somewhat famous.

Despite his protests, he was pushed to participate, first by the scientists involved in its creation, then the BBA, then, finally, his friends and self-made family.

"Bryan," Tala had said, arms held wide, "This is amazing, don't you see? You could have a family! Something that we've never had a chance to have before... At least try? You might not even get any results, but please, try?"

Kai had come later, quietly informing him that he had already been through the program, out of idle curiosity, just to see if he had any relations besides his grandfather. The results had been negative, but Kai had said that he felt better, with solid facts, and wouldn't he feel the same?

The truth was, he was better of not knowing, and whoever he was related to was better off not knowing as well. He didn't want to know the names of the people who had discarded him in the frozen hellhole that was the Abbey- he wasn't sure he could control himself if he found out. He'd been learning, getting better with the help of Tala, Kai, and some very well paid psychiatrists, but he still had problems with emotions. Lots of problems.

He didn't think anyone took his damaged mental state into account while they pushed him to discover the identities of his genetic donors. He refused to call them parents, after what they'd done to him, and he wasn't sure he could trust anyone they'd been related to either.

That was why, when he woke up in a hospital bed three days after he'd laid down his final response, he was infuriated to discover that everyone had completely disregarded his wishes and had run the godforsaken test anyways.

"I honestly tried to stop them, Bryan," Tala murmured, seated, back straight, in a plastic hospital chair, "I swear. They walked all over me with regulations, said that because you were underage you had no choice and none of us are old enough to be considered proxies."

He sighed and twisted his fingers together, wincing when the action pulled at his casted wrist.

"I don't blame you," he said, staring blankly ahead, "Not your fault. It's mine, for getting put in here in the first place."

He, in quite possibly the most ridiculous turn of events ever, had managed to get hit by a motorcyclist going fifty in a school zone. The guy had clipped him; the side mirror had caught him full on the arm and now he was sporting a compound fracture to the wrist and three bruised ribs. They'd put him under to set it, and, while he was out, had apparently stolen a vial of blood and had run it through the system he'd been trying to avoid.

He'd made himself feel better by terrifying and intimidating every doctor that came into his room, whether it was for him or the guy on the other side of the curtain. The nurses he left alone, if only because they were in charge of his pain medication and visitors.

"Bryan, they..."

Tala hesitated, wringing his hands together in an uncharacteristically nervous gesture.

"They got hits."

He opened his mouth, ready to refuse to see his parents or whoever they'd found, but Tala held up a hand to silence him before he'd even started.

"Just... hear me out, okay? It isn't your parents or anything, they apparently died about six years after you turned up at the Abbey."

He closed his mouth and nodded, relaxing his clenched fists and smoothing out the blankets over his lap, fiddling with the corner of one absently.

"There are three of them. Your mother's sister, her son, and your mother's other sister's kid. Petunia Dursley, thirty-one, I have a file on her here if you want it later. Dudley Dursley, age eight, and Harteland Potter, age seven."

He curled up, pressing his face to his knees and breathing deeply, hands rising to clutch at his hair.

"Bryan, tell me what you're feeling."

Tala's hand pressed against the back of his neck and he leaned into it, taking another slow, deep breath.

"There's too much. I... I'm angry, I think. Sad. Scared. Happy. Nervous."

He took another breath, trying to focus on what he was feeling and why. He still wasn't entirely familiar with being able to feel- his entire life the feelings had been trained right out of him, and suddenly they were making a violent resurgence. It threw him off balance.

"I had family this entire time, yet I still had to spend my life in the goddamn Abbey... but I have family, I have a family, and that's... that's... I don't know. I don't know how I feel about that. And my mother and father are dead, and I'm glad, but I don't think I should be, and... this is a mess. A huge fucking mess, just like my life," he groaned, flopping backwards onto the bed and hissing when his cast glanced off the metal railing, "I'm done. Fuck feelings, who needs them."

"You do, technically," Tala said, placing a folder on the bedside table and ruffling his hair, "Bryan... one more thing. And you have to promise not to get upset, okay?"

He screwed his eyes shut, already knowing that he'd hate anything that could possibly come out of Tala's mouth after that sentence. That was a bad sentence, usually followed by tales of Ian's school mishaps or the loss of something important.

"They're sending you to them. Until you turn 18."

He took a deep breath and slammed his casted wrist into the metal railing, using the bite of pain to push away the overwhelming flood or rage.

"Bryan?"

"I'm fine," he said, forcing his voice to hold steady, "I was under the assumption that I had been emancipated?"

"In Russia. Not in America. The BBA operates in America and, since you're technically their ward, they have the right to ship you off to your real family if they so choose. Which they kind of did."

"Where?" he asked.

"England. Surrey, to be exact."

He pushed himself upright, reached out a hand, and grabbed Tala's shoulder, carefully making sure he didn't squeeze too tight.

"I will not leave you. Ian, you, or Sergei. I don't care if I have a "real family" now, I will not leave the one I have created for myself. I refuse."

Tala settled a hand over his, tangling their fingers together.

"You won't. Kai, he owns a home in London. Near Surrey. We'll be close."

He relaxed at that, leaning forward to rest his head against Tala's other shoulder, breathing deeply. Tala's free hand ran through his hair soothingly, gently straightening out the mess it had become.

"Fine. I... I can do this, if I do not have to leave any of you behind."

He continued to breathe, trying to focus on himself and Tala and nothing else. While it worked in calming him down, it also made him unbearably drowsy, a result of the drugs being pumped through his system.

"Go to sleep. Sergei and I will sort everything out, alright?" Tala murmured, easing him back into the bed and brushing his hair back from his face, "I'll be back with the others when visiting hours begin."

His half-asleep mind registered something wrong with that statement, but before he could figure it out, Tala ran out of the room, barely escaping before a nurse he recognized from the night shift walked in, prompting him to glance over at the clock in confusion.

The swimming numbers read 1:42AM.

He closed his eyes and sighed, smirking. Tala was an idiot sometimes, but he was also an amazing friend.

* * *

As a warning: This rewrite will be very slow. I now have to worry about college, russian classes, trigonometry, all sorts of strange classes required for my major, and the stress that comes from being surrounded by no less than three people at any given time.

Also, I don't really remember where the hell I was going with this story, so most of it will be made up. Yay.

As I said upstairs, please, if you have any opinions or questions or suggestions about the story, please don't be afraid to offer them. Kind reviews do wonders on bad days :)


	2. Chapter 2

I will warn you right now, do not expect the chapters to be uploaded this quickly for the rest of eternity. I start college in a week and i have two foreign language classes (because trig is totally a foreign language okay) and an art class run by a drill sergeant to deal with.

See end notes for important crap.

* * *

Every single day began and ended exactly the same as the days before.

"Brat! Get up and make breakfast, Vernon and Dudley will be down soon and if the food isn't on the table by then, there will be hell to pay!"

He shuffled out of his cupboard, pushing the sleeves of his hand-me-down shirt up to his elbows. The neckline was stretched out, and the collar dripped off one shoulder, but it was one of the smaller shirts he owned, and thus the best for cooking in.

He rushed to the kitchen and set to work, cooking the shockingly large amount of food his uncle and cousin required for breakfast; a package of bacon, four eggs each, two sausages a piece, two pieces of toast a piece, and a bowl of fresh fruit and yoghurt for his aunt, who was sitting primly at the table, watching his every move like a hawk.

He was lucky he'd woken up early enough to comb out his hair with the broken brush he'd squirreled away, and braid it back out of his face. If he didn't, she would stand behind him and pull it if she thought it was getting too close to her food.

He hefted the heavy pans off the range and shifted them onto the counter, spooning portions onto easier-to-carry plates and rushing them to the kitchen table mere minutes before his remaining family thundered down the stairs.

"Boy! Did you finish breakfast?"

"Yes sir," he replied meekly, keeping his head bowed.

His uncle sat at the table, the chair groaning under his weight. He was both eagerly awaiting and dreading the day it gave in and collapsed under the large man's bulk- waiting because it would be the perfect demonstration of karma, and dreading because he knew he'd be blamed for it.

"This piece is burnt!" Vernon snarled, throwing a still spitting-hot piece of bacon and successfully hitting him in the face with it, the burning grease searing his skin on contact, "You get nothing for breakfast today, freak, and nothing for lunch either if you don't do your chores perfectly!"

He skittered out of the dining room and back into the kitchen, hurriedly dabbing at his face with a paper towel. Rubbing at the hot grease on his face would only take off the skin underneath it, and he knew from personal experience how unpleasant that was. He ran the sink with cold water and splashed it on his cheek, thankful that the loud conversation and chewing from the dining room would drown out the soft sound of the water. He couldn't cover the three-finger-width burn swiftly forming under his eye, but washing it would hopefully prevent it from becoming too infected.

That done, he got to work on the dishes, cleaning up as much as he could before he was forced to pick up the rest of the mess in the dining room, which only added to his overall workload.

"Brat."

He swiftly placed the last dish in the dishwasher and darted into the living room, standing with his head bowed in front of his aunt, who was looking around the living room imperiously.

"Your usual chore list will be cut in half today," she began, brushing some imaginary dust off the arm of the couch, "Instead, you are to go to the garage and bring the boxes of furniture into Dudley's second bedroom, after you clean it out. You will then follow the directions on the box and set up everything, do you understand?"

"Yes ma'am," he responded, fingers twitching as he reigned in his curiosity. Questions were not allowed in the Dursley house, none whatsoever. A question would get him a hit, slap, or, if he was lucky, and angry dismissal, but no answer.

Asking questions was stupid but he still really, really wanted to.

Fortunately, his aunt was a gossip, and, as a gossip, she was used to talking to anyone in hearing range about anything that was happening at any given moment. He lingered behind, absently dusting off a few shelves, and to his delight, she began to ramble.

"I can't believe Rose actually managed to bear a child," she huffed dramatically, elegantly perching herself on the couch and reaching for the remote, "She was always such a successful bint, but then she ran off to Russia with that commie bastard husband of hers on some sort of ill-fated business trip. She died almost eleven, twelve years ago, and this is the first I'm hearing of it! I can't believe it! And now I'm expected to care for her child! As if I don't have enough to focus on, with my poor Duddykins and Lily's wretched excuse for progeny!"

He finished dusting off the tables and shelves and quietly folded up his dusting rag, trying to sneak out of the room before his aunt fully noticed his presence.

"Hopefully he won't turn out to be as much of a disappointment as his father... and we are getting a fairly large stipend for his care... perhaps it won't be all that bad..."

He crept out of the room and up the stairs, opening to the door to Dudley's second bedroom and stopping short.

It was a complete and utter disaster.

The entire room was a wreck, filled with broken and shattered pieces of plastic, melted and damaged toys, video game equipment, old television sets and computers, anything and everything one could think of, tossed about the room like a tornado had hit.

"Boy!" his aunt yelled up the stairs, the shrill voice catching him by surprise, "That room needs to be done by tomorrow or you get punished, do you understand!"

He groaned quietly but trudged though the mass of broken materials to the middle fo the room, looking out on the carnage with dismay. It would take him all day to complete this, and he still had other chores and the furniture to set up.

Today was going to be a very long and hard day.

* * *

Hey guys, next chapter's up. Look, I really appreciate all the notes and follows this has gotten, but I really do need some reviews.

If you've read the original, I want to know what you think about the changes- did you like the original better? Is this better? Are you missing things?

I want to know how you feel about this as a whole. Is there too much description? Not enough? Is there anything you ant to see?

I usually don't beg for reviews but come on, guys, I am really rolling on the floor and begging here. I can't make it good without feedback.


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